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A WOMAN kidnapped by ISIS and forced to marry at 11 years old has been rescued from Gaza after 10 years captivity.
Fawzia Amin Sido, a Yazidi, escaped from her horror captivity after she was forced to wed a Palestinian IS fighter in 2014.
Reuters
Reuters
Reuters
Rex
ReutersSido, from Iraq, faced repeated abuse and was trafficked to Gaza facing a decade of captivity and torture.
But, the 21-year-old is now free after the Israeli Defence Force claimed an airstrike likely killed her husband.
Sido was then able to escape her captivity and hide elsewhere before being rescued.
The Israeli military said Sido was eventually brought to safety during a “complex operation coordinated between Israel, the United States, and other international actors”.
The IDF said: “The young girl was extracted from the Gaza Strip in recent days in a secret operation through the Kerem Shalom crossing.”
“After crossing into Israel, she was taken to Jordan via the Allenby Crossing and then on to her family in Iraq.”
She was taken home to Iraq via Israel and then Jordan.
Steve Mamen, a Jewish Canadian businessman known as the ‘Jewish Shindler’ has rescued thousands of Yazidis from captivity.
In a post on X, Maman said: “I made a promise to Fawzia the yazidi who was hostage of Hamas in Gaza that I would bring her back home to her mother in Sinjar.
“To her it seemed surreal and impossible but not to me, my only enemy was time. Our team reunited her moments ago with her mother and family in Sinjar.”
Talking to the Jerusalem Post, Maman said freeing Sido was the most difficult rescue he had ever done.
He said: “Many interactions were critical and hurtful, but the success of the mission is what heals you from these attacks. This, for me, is a ray of light. M. [Sido] has a chance to rebuild her life.
“She was 11 years old when they took her, and no child chooses at that age to become a hostage at the hands of ISIS-Hamas.
“This is what I would’ve done for anyone else, regardless of their religion, and this is what makes us special as Jews – we are able to look beyond the dry politics of a national who’s technically from a country that hates us and see the human aspect of life.
“We’re willing to help all people succeed.”
The chief of staff to Iraq’s foreign minister said Sido is in good physical condition but it suffering from intense trauma.
A state department spokesman said the US on Tuesday “helped to safely evacuate from Gaza a young Yazidi woman to be reunited with her family in Iraq”.
Who are the Yazidis and what did ISIS do to them?
The Yazidis are a religious minority who live in in the Middle East – largely in Iraqi Kurdistan.
Throughout their history they have faced persecution from the neighbouring Muslims.
Their religion stems from Iran thousands of years ago long before Islam was around.
Their god, Mele Taus, is a benevolent angel who appears as a peacock.
In 2014, the Islamic State overran parts of Iraq, including land where the Yazidis lived.
The vile terrorists carried out a genocide against the group across three years.
They massacred, raped, and forced people to convert their religion to ISIS’ twisted version of Islam.
Many women were also solved into sexual slavery as IS sought to profit from their misery.
Ultimately, 5,000 Yazidis in a population of 1.5m were killed. A whopping 500,000 were tragically displaced.
Up to 10,000 Yazidis were kidnapped.
Reuters
English (US)